


Blake and Doctor Who Meet in a Corridor

by AtomMudman



Series: The Ballad of Karnation Lee [3]
Category: Blake's 7, Cthulhu Mythos - H. P. Lovecraft, Doctor Who, Kaldor City, Plan 9 from Outer Space (1959), The Stranger (BBV Series), The Time Travellers (BBV Series)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2018-12-14
Packaged: 2019-09-18 10:32:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16993374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AtomMudman/pseuds/AtomMudman
Summary: The final story of the Karnation Lee Trilogy finds Roj Blake and the Fourth Doctor separated from the Liberator and the TARDIS. Trapped in a time-corridor, they must work together in order to escape. Along the way they will meet two strangers with revelations that will change their lives.





	1. Blake and Doctor Who Meet in a Corridor

Roj Blake had no idea where he was.

 

This wasn't unusual. If it wasn't a Federation cell, then it was a world full of aliens beyond his imagining. It was only a matter of figuring things out, in the end. He looked around and tried to see if there were any clues to his location. But he could already tell that such clues would be in short supply.

 

All around him was a skyway of kind, a hallway made of rushing crimson energy. This energy felt just like the cold concrete of a wall. Silence surrounded him, despite the motion of the hall he stood in. He could see through the energy partially, and outside of this passage there was only darkness. Sometimes there were lightning flashes within the darkness, but these were brief and soundless.

 

There was only one choice available to him now. He had to walk down this corridor and see where it went.

 

It wasn't long before he heard footsteps coming towards him. He didn't have a gun on him, nor a communicator. He already knew of course that the _Liberator_ was in no condition to teleport him back. That's why he'd been running—the Andromedans had damaged it enough that they'd had to jump. He knew it was stupid to use the teleport instead of the escape craft, but there hadn't been time. He knew the others would have gotten off—in fact the last he'd heard from Jenna was that she was boarding a pod and jumping.

 

And of course there wasn't anywhere to hide. It reminded him of a nightmare Vila had shared with him; where he was being chased by something in a corridor, and he could only stand still or run away from it. Except then he heard a third step of footsteps out ahead of him. Blake knew Vila wouldn't start walking towards the steps in the dark of his own free will—but he wasn't Vila. Maybe whoever made those steps had the answers.

 

Eventually, the figure passed through the darkness that resulted from the emptiness outside. There were shadows going both ways, so unless he could see in the dark this man had no more sight of Blake than Blake had of him. But at last they were together. Blake frowned—this man looked like some sort of psychopath.

 

He was an older man, whose large mass of curly gray hadn't receded and was never likely to. His face was starting to get flabby around his cheeks and chin, but his bugged-out blue eyes were as piercing as swords forged in fire. Atop his head was a wide-brimmed burgundy fedora; the color of this hat matched the rest of his outfit, which included a sweeping coat and a scarf of prodigious length, which wrapped around his neck several times with enough left over to trail behind him. The only thing that wasn't burgundy was the white shirt he wore beneath the scarlet coat, which suffered from an overlarge collar that poked its way out the front of the stranger's outfit. On the tips of this collar were a pair of crimson question marks. The stranger raised a hand and flashed a smile which at once seemed to have too many teeth in it.

 

“Ah! Hello,” he said. His voice came out as a deep resonance that contradicted his appearance. “I was waiting for us to catch up to each other. You know, you look very rough and tumble, not someone I'd like to come up on in a dark alley. But then, I suppose we've already done that, haven't we? Found each other in dark alleys, I mean.”

 

Blake had trouble finding his words at first.

 

“Well, go on!” said the other man. “What's the matter, cat got your tongue? I was hoping we'd do introductions. I'm the Doctor.”

 

“Roj Blake,” Blake choked out. “You're a doctor, you say? What are you doing here?”

 

“No, not a doctor, _the_ Doctor—the definite article, you might say. I'm here because I was taken here. By who, I don't know. Did you bring me here?”

 

“No. I ended up here after my ship's teleporter malfunctioned.”  
  


“Oh, they do have a tendency to do that, don't they? Teleporters. I'll stick with my TARDIS, or I would, if I could find it...”

 

“I'm sorry—TARDIS?”

 

“Oh, yes, my ship. Tall and blue. Have you seen it anywhere?”

 

“No.”

 

“Well, if we look for it together, I'd be more than willing to offer you a ride back to your ship.”

 

“I shouldn't go back to my ship at the moment. It's under attack. And in any case...” He sighed. He needed to unburden this to someone, and he didn't think this man was any harm. “In any case, I was going to part ways with them anyway. I had an agreement with Avon—and so, I'm due to meet someone on Epheron. They're going to help me book passage to Gauda Prime.”

 

“What's on Gauda Prime?”

 

Blake didn't answer. It could have been that he didn't know.

 

“You mentioned someone named Avon.”

 

“Yes, Kerr Avon. If he can recover my ship, he's its captain now.”

 

“You know, I thought Leela and I met someone by that name on Kaldor—I must be mistaken though.”

 

“Must be.” Blake squinted. “So you're just the Doctor then. No other name?”

 

“I'm a Doctor who helps. That's all that matters.”

 

“Alright, Doctor-Who-Helps. My name is Roj Blake. What is this place?”

 

“Why, it's a time corridor.” The Doctor spoke as if Blake should have already known that.

 

“And what's a time corridor?”

 

“It's a hole in the time vortex, used by time-travelers to cross from one era to another. Usually used by Daleks.”

 

“Daleks? You don't think _they_ made this thing?” Blake looked around. “It's impossible. The Daleks were wiped out when they invaded Earth, what, 700 years ago?”

 

“If only the universe were so lucky. Also, don't forget, this is a _time_ corridor. Even if the Daleks are extinct in your point in history it doesn't mean they can't be reaching out from the past.”

 

“That's true.”

 

“But if it was the Daleks, this place would have already been flooded with attack squads. There's one thing you can trust about Daleks, you know, they've no sense of subtlety. Whatever it was, it was enough to pull me out of my TARDIS without any form of teleport system.” The Doctor stared off into the distance, concern appearing suddenly on his face. “Oh dear. I do hope that Adric is fine by himself aboard the TARDIS now that Romana and K9 are gone.”

 

“If it's not the Daleks—do you think that it could be the Andromedans?”

  
“You'll have to be more specific, there are a lot of people who live in the Andromeda.”

 

“I've never met them. Some rumors are that they're insectoid.”

 

“They could be Wirrn, then, I suppose—but rumors are rumors.”

 

“Quite so.”  
  


“Well, the Wirrn don't have time corridor technology. So we're back at Square One.”

 

“Doctor, if this corridor is used to travel through time, then surely it has an end at some point.”

 

“Are you proposing we try to see how deep the rabbit-hole goes?”

  
“Something like that.”

 

The Doctor grinned again. “I could grow to like you, Roj Blake.”

 

Blake didn't give any indication that the feeling was mutual. But the two men took off at the quick pace back in the direction Blake had come from.

 

“You know, this is strange, but—I could have sworn that Jenna mentioned meeting a woman once who insisted on no other name than 'the Doctor.' A young blonde woman.”

 

“Well, I can't remember ever being a young woman. If Romana was still with me, she could probably tell me if that was in my past or future. But I think that if your friend Jenna met me when I was a woman, then it must have been the latter. In any case, I wish my successor, whoever she might be, the best of luck.”

 

“It was on the planet Elysia. In fact, that woman and Jenna may have traveled together for some time before she returned to the _Liberator—_ but I don't know when that could have taken place. Cally thinks she just had a dream.”

 

“I suppose I'll find out someday.”  
  


“If that _was_ you. There are a lot of doctors.”

 

“You'd think there'd just be four, but they keep leaking back from the future.”

 

Blake said, “You don't make any sense, Doctor. I don't know if that makes you more or less likely to be working for the Federation.”

 

“Now that's another riddle of memory. I don't think I've ever worked for any sort of Federation. But I can retrace my steps. Let's see—Adric and I dropped off a robot dog with an old friend—I warned my other selves about the Rani—”

 

“Doctor, I don't think that'll be necessary. I can trust that you aren't working for the Federation.”

 

“You're on my good side too—'trust' is one of my favorite words.” He halted then, putting one hand up. “Speaking of trust, Mr. Blake. Can you trust that my eyes are better than yours and that I see a door at the end of this passage?”

 

“If there's a door there, we should probably go through it, if we're ever going to get out of this place. I'll trust you as far as my feet can carry me.”

 

“You should be able to see it soon. It's not normally this dark in the time vortex—it must be something wrong with the corridor we're in. It's badly made or something.”

 

“Doctor, I can see the door. It's an older style—it has a knob.”

 

“Yes, I suppose in your time period doors with knobs are about as common as chairs on Skaro. Don't worry—once you figure them out you never forget.”

 

Blake couldn't help but feel a twinge in his chest from the Doctor's remark—a mix of mild anger at being condescended to, and amusement in the man's inability to be shaken. It was the same twinge he got from Orac's remarks. In fact if the Doctor was an older man he'd be bizarrely similar to Orac, for a creature of flesh and blood.

 

Eventually they reached the door. “Do the ends of time corridors normally end this way?” Blake inquired.

 

“No, not that I know of...it's normally just a portal or gateway or some kind. But maybe we've crossed the portal and we're standing where it comes out.”

 

“Only one way to find out.” Blake turned the knob and they stepped beyond the door.

 

What awaited them was a long metal corridor, of a very plain sort. Somehow it looked familiar to both of them, though they could tell they'd never been here before. Their footsteps rang against the metal beneath them, as they saw that the hallway parted off in a branch, and twisted up ahead. Blake was about to see where the main line led, when the Doctor called him over.

 

“Blake.” The Doctor was gesturing over to a gap in the metal. Blake realized it was a porthole. As he peered out, he saw what the Doctor put to words. “We're still in the time vortex.”

 

“That means we're still in the corridor,” he said. “Someone's building a base out here. The Federation?”

 

“No, the Federation had no knowledge of time travel, or time corridors. I'd be disappointed if it was them. Though this is a little crude, if I'm being honest.”

 

“Doctor, take a look at this.”

 

Now Blake had parted again from the Doctor, to look down the fork off the hallway. When he was in position the Doctor could see a small flight of stairs leading up to a door. The door had a sign on it which read: “OFFICE.”

 

“Oh, they have management here,” he said quietly. “How convenient. Now we've someone to complain to.”

 

“Let's go complain,” Blake said with a grin.

 

They walked together to the door but when they reached it, the Doctor cautioned Blake back, insisting silently on going first. He opened the door and stepped inside, and Blake followed with trepidation. However, his anxieties dissipated when he saw who it was who managed this “office.” A man and a woman stood before him, and like the Doctor, they sent many impressions of being beyond the Federation's employ.

 

The woman was like something out of the history books. She seemed to have donned the style of the 1970s, wearing a tight turtleneck sweater, tight red corduroy jeans, and large glasses with fully-circular lenses. Unusually for the time, however, she wore a belt with a leather sheath on it for a knife of cruel length. The man, meanwhile, was dressed all in white, though his clothes seemed faintly smudged, as if he had blundered against a giant powderpuff prowling around backstage at a theatre. There were also sweat stains on his armpits; those were of less mysterious origin. He had a cigarette trickling from his lip as he stared at them with alcoholic eyes. He had large ears and his jaw looked green from the crusty beard emerging from his unwashed skin. Yet, there was a near-immaculate carnation on his lapel, whose cleanliness seemed to imply it was a parasite leeching out the lifeforce of its wearer.

 

“What do you want?” he asked.

 

“Hello! I'm the Doctor. This is Mr. Blake.”

 

“Please just call me Blake.”

 

“Any relative of Sexton Blake?” said the stranger.

 

“N-not that I know of, no.”

 

“Too bad. We could be good friends.” He sighed. “My name's Karnation Lee. My ancestor was the detective Nelson Lee, who was a pal of Sexton Blake.”

 

“I've always meant to visit those two,” the Doctor confessed.

 

“Did you bring us here?” Blake said then.

 

“What do you mean?”

 

“I mean, we ended up in your...corridor.”

 

“Yeah, it is my corridor, isn't it? I didn't entirely intend for this to happen, so. I'm sorry.” He sighed. “I returned to my native 41st Century, which was a mistake. I tried to take up my life where I left off, before I helped out that Mayfair guy, and the Time Lord.”

 

“A Time Lord?” It was the Doctor who raised his voice now. “ _What_ Time Lord?”

 

“He called himself the Master.”

 

“The Master? If you worked with him, you're either a fool or you have no regard for any sort of life.”

 

“He had me build him a new body, and then he recruited me to build him an android army. I'm good with androids, you know. I learned from the Kraals, and I passed their knowledge on to men like Taren Capel.”

 

“So you're the kind you enjoys flirting with evil.”

 

“Not so, Doctor. I didn't _enjoy_ working for the Master. I didn't know that Taren Capel was an anti-human fanatic. Nor that the Kraals would use their androids to invade Earth and other planets.”

 

“Yes, you didn't enjoy working for the Master. But you did it anyway.”

 

“Doctor, maybe I'm not part of this, but who's the Master?”

 

The Doctor remembered Blake was there. “It's a very long story, I'll explain later. Suffice it to say he is the twisted image of cruelty. Now, I want to see if Mr. Lee here is of the same mold.”

 

“As I told you, I built the Master his new body, but I did so without knowing his identity. When I accompanied him later it was by force. I escaped him as soon as I found friends who helped get me outta his custody.”

 

“And then you built this time tunnel,” the Doctor said. “You hid in it.”

 

“My fellow Jovians didn't take kindly to my linking them to the 29th Century. Specifically to a warzone during the Intergalactic War.”

 

“The Andromedans _had_ made it to Jupiter,” said Blake.

 

“I set up this base with Madame Jeune here to try to close the way back to the 41st Century. And so far, we've succeeded.”

 

“Madame Jeune...” said the Doctor quietly. He pointed at the young woman, who had remained silent all this time. “Wait. You dyed your hair, but I know you now. Miss Young! How are you?”

 

The Doctor's voice was warm as he approached her. “I wish I could recall why you and I parted ways...”

 

“I did not dye my hair, Doctor, I took the dye out,” said the woman called Jeune, or Young. “Surely you see more of a resemblance now.”

 

“A resemblance? To what?”

 

“Oh, Doctor. You always were a trifle inattentive.”

 

“Blake, you seem a little more level-headed than these cloudcuckoolanders,” Lee said. “Don't you want to know about my life? I know your story—you're history to me. Perhaps I can be of aid to you?”

 

“You know of my fight with the Federation.”

 

“Yeah, it's a legend sorta in the 41st Century. I used to be an adventurer myself, you know, before my bad run-ins with evil Time Lords and demons that come in bottles.”

 

“And that's how you gained your skill in robotics?” Blake stared at the woman the Doctor had called Miss Young. “Is she one of yours?”

 

“No, she's something more complicated. I'm sure you'll explain that in short order, eh, Madame Jeune?”

 

“You may speak first, my friend,” she said.  
  


“In the end there's not much to me. My ancestors were roboticists. One was named Vaughn Orloff, and he was a disciple of Rossum himself. In his old age he married the daughter of Nelson Lee and his enemy-ally...Mademoiselle Miton, the Black Wolf. This woman was named Varga Lee; her twin sister Sarah had a boy named Cody, who in the 1980s was the host of the Shiqquwts, the Dreamchildren of Yog-Sothoth. Vaughn and Varga died in 1958 and were turned into zombies during the Eddorian invasion of that year. The so-called 'Plan 9 from Outer Space.'”

 

“But your adventures?” Blake asked.

 

“Oh, yes—centuries passed after the Eddorians tried and failed to take over Earth that year. But the universe sometimes likes to keep families together, to torture 'em. So I was stuck with the unfortunate burden of traveling with echoes of my famous ancestor, like time itself was playin' some sort of sick joke on me. Nipper was my best pal, and there was Eileen Masters, descended from Captain Billy Masters and Ms. Dare. Rajah and Wolf were the names of two that joined us when we journeyed to the archive-planets of St. Frank and St. Ninian. Umlosi joined us, and maybe he was the original Umlosi, having become immortal—he still had his dream-snake familiar. The guy we battled most, who kept on stalking us, was Lyn Clayton, the new Dr. Karnak. She was descended from the original Karnak, who was born Elwyn Clayton. This went on till I got old and basically everyone else got blown up. I was rescued first by a pair of travelers named Alice Perkins and Solomon, and then, when they left me, I met Madame Jeune here.”

 

“And so what's your story?” Blake asked Jeune.

 

“You're asking the right questions, Roj,” the Doctor put in. “I remember our adventure together in the North Sea, Ms. Young. We fought a mass of mutated seaweed. After that we drove Bessie back to the TARDIS, and I took you to—” He stopped. “No, it wasn't Blackpool...it was...” He stared at her. “Do you know?”

 

“I had to rub the knowledge of our adventures from your mind, Doctor. It's nothing personal, but I wanted to make sure you didn't look too close and realize what I had done.”

 

“Look to close? Why, I've looked you over, and I—” The Doctor squinted.

 

“Blake.”

 

“Doctor?”

 

“Look at her. Look hard. Her face is...different.” His voice was low now. “Her face has... _always been_...very different.”

 

Then the Doctor took a step back.

 

“Leela?”

 

“In a manner of speaking, Doctor.”

 

“I left you on Gallifrey. With Andred. Not to mention K9. Are you saying you found out some way to change your appearance and rejoined me, only to wipe my memory of the whole thing?”

 

Young said nothing for a moment before continuing. “My life is intrinsically tied to your future, Doctor. Admittedly, even I had blurred awareness of my own identity. It took me a while to remember. And it wasn't my memories that returned, it was Leela's. I began to recall all of her adventures with you, Doctor, leading up to when you met her during the adventure with Xoanon. I gain her skills, too, included her talents with a knife. But I began to understand that these weren't my memories. Eventually my true life unfolded. I remembered that I was a law-enforcer among my people, and I had become Leela after chasing a convict.

 

“I tried to figure out from Leela's memories if I had stolen her body her or just a facsimile. There are tales of a Time War in one of Gallifrey's possible futures, which includes Leela's death in captivity. But through reincarnation or regeneration she was reborn on Earth under a different name...”

 

“Leela dead? In captivity? Don't be ridiculous,” the Doctor said. “If Gallifrey ever fell under attack, and Leela was killed it would be on the front lines, taking down as many of the enemy with her as possible. You must have read her biodata incorrectly.”

 

“But I was not Leela's body—not her corpse, not an echo of her shrugged by a regeneration. No, this was merely the image of Leela. Once I figured that out it all fell into place. In your next body, Doctor, you shall again face the Daleks. They will interrogate you and probe your mind. You will show them images of your past incarnations, and all your past companions. You'll be in too much pain to see that Leela is missing, but that's because in that moment I took her image from the Dalek scanner. I was able to scurry away to a different time, and a different place. Forgetting all the time that I was the Young.”

 

“The Young?” the Doctor asked.

 

“All my people have titles, Doctor. The Good, the Wise, the Terrible, the Noble, the Old...the Young. In the future, at the coronation of Elizabeth II—you will know my intended prey. The savage known as the Wire.”

 

“I see. I'll keep an eye out for them.”  
  


“For _her_. I was her antithesis. It was only natural that I pursue her—but she tricked me into taking on the form on your companion. I was stranded for a long time after that. I only saw that your future self defeated her. Thus satisfied I decided to use Leela's attributes to become your companion, inserting myself into your history after Leela left but before you were told to search for the Key to Time. But my new biodata was corrupting yours, causing oddities. For instance, Doctor, we traveled in Bessie together, didn't we?”

 

“I see what you mean. I don't remember driving the old girl around after I left Sarah Jane on Earth. In fact, I think I lost track of her...some sort of mix-up with UNIT's garages, the Brigadier told me.” He stared at her, a wide grin breaking out across his face. But now that I remember you—I remember our adventures together. You were a splendid companion. And if I can trust you, Ms. Young, I can likely trust Mr. Lee here. Are you having any success closing the time corridor, or have you just built an office that says 'Office' on the front door?”

 

“We're working on it. We're aware of the damage, but it's hard to figure out what to do. Even as we built this control center to uplink with our generators back on 41st Century Jupiter.”

 

“Let me examine your equipment,” the Doctor said. “There's usually a way to figure these things out if you were able to start them up. Though as a good quote from a foolish man says, 'Do not call up that which you can't put down.'”

 

“It won't happen again, Doctor. I intend to go into a less damaging illicit enterprise.”

 

“That's a good fellow. Ms. Young, would you like to assist me?”

 

“I would be delighted, Doctor. I would like to speak to you of things to come.”

 

“That sounds wonderful. Now, is this your artron core...?”

 

The Doctor was now wondering if Young, or the Young, could see the figure at his periphery, whose appearances had led to him donning these dark mourning-clothes—the figure with white skin, dressed in similarly-pale clothes, who stared at him out of infinity.

 

That left Lee alone with Blake. Blake recalled Lee's words, and wondered in perhaps he was descended from the man Lee had cited as a friend of his ancestor. That Sexton Blake fellow.

 

“What's your story, Blake?” Lee asked then. Blake had hardly noticed his cigarette smoke but now its putrid smell hovered around him. He had lit a second one with the tip of the first.

 

“Fairly simple. Fighting the Federation. I'm on the run now. If you're from my future, there's no harm telling you I'm trying to get to Gauda Prime. Does that have the same reputation in the 41st Century as it does the 29th?”

 

“It does, last I'd heard. That is, if the last rumor I'd heard didn't involve it being blown up.”

 

“One of the residents?”

 

“Oh yes.”

 

“What a terrible place. But that's why I'm going there.”

 

“Yeah, I always thought it was a bit interesting. I wanted to check it out myself. You've got an escort out there, right?”

 

“Of course.”

 

“Well, that's a rookie's mistake. I'll let you know that now. All the same, if we do manage to break the connection, we're going to leave this facility behind in a hurry. I was wondering if you'd like me to go with you. I need to work experience. Gotta get something a little more uplifting on my resume than working for a Time Lord criminal with a rep as bad as Zodin or the Rocket Men.”

 

Blake smiled. “But don't forget that I, too, am a dangerous criminal.”

 

“You _do_ seem familiar in what I remember of my history classes. I may be a crook at heart but I stayed in school. It would be interesting learning the heart of a figure from ancient history and all.”

 

Blake's smile lapsed. This was business as usual now; did he trust the tempting offer before him, or did he recognize that something was trying to take advantage of him?

 

He wondered what Avon would say.

 

But then he saw in Lee's face both a glimmer of Avon and an absence of him. Both of those impressions tempted him further.

 

“You know, Blake,” Lee said. “I think if they fix whatever's up, there's going to be some serious timestream desynchronization. If you and I travel together we'll retain our memories, but—you'll lose your memories of the Doctor and Madame Jeune.”

 

“Interesting. And unfortunate. I've been getting a little fond of the Doctor.”

 

“It seems to be mutual. Though there's something sad in his face when he looks at you. Like he knows what's gonna happen to you or something.”

 

It was at that moment that the Doctor and Madame Jeune gestured lightly to the others. “The Doctor knows how to fix the corridor,” Jeune declared.

 

“It's a simple matter really. Neutron flow's got the wrong polarity. I can fix it as soon as you're all ready.”

 

“That means hang onto something,” Lee chuckled. “Ohh, this is gonna be rich...”

 

“I'm ready, Doctor,” Blake said.

 

“I'm ready, too,” Jeune added.

 

“Then let's go,” said the Doctor. They couldn't see what it was his hands were doing, but they felt the effects instantly.

 

It was like slipping on ice—but in time. None of their brains could handle it, except maybe the Doctor's. Blake felt himself collapse in the past, the present, and the future, onto a hard, cold, invisible surface. The metal walls and floor of the office began to drift away. He saw his past unfold to him; he was back in the cell after his first capture, screaming in agony as they took his memories away. Moving forward, he felt his coursing waves of hope come crashing down, as if it were for the first time, as he once more watched Gan die. Then the past was gone, giving way to the future: he saw Avon in a dark room, staring down at a man who looked like him. He was in a bed, and he was frail to the point where if he left that bed he would die. He wanted to shout to Avon that that wasn't him, that it was a trap, but it was too late. He was pushed even farther forward, watching as time took all of his friends and allies from him. Zen. Jenna. Cally. Even Vila. And Avon? Where was Avon, when death came for them in the end...?

 

Time and memory swirled together, rose up, and collapsed.

 

Yet his rest was all too brief. When he opened his eyes it was under the milky-pale sky that hung over the rustic badlands of the planet Epheron. He was on his back now. He turned, and saw that Karnation Lee was already standing.

 

The dust from their surroundings had stained Lee's white clothing further. He didn't seem to care. Distracted, he nursed the small carnation that adorned his suit. There was a mask of worry on his face, but in a second it looked just as likely that he'd tear the flower from his shirt and give nothing more than a shrug.

 

“We made it,” Blake said. “We got away from the time corridor. And I got away with my memory of—of...”

 

He remembered Madame Jeune, but that was only because of Lee. Lee had shared so many memories with her that he could never forget her. But as for—the other fellow—they had no recollection.

 

“So,” Lee said. “Gauda Prime? We goin' there, or...?”

 

“You're really willing to join my fight against the Federation?”  
  


“Why not?”

 

Blake didn't answer at first.

 

“What's wrong?” Lee asked.

 

“It's nothing,” Blake said. “Come on.”

 

He remembered now his brief visions of what was yet to come. He had not seen Karnation Lee with him when Avon finally tracked him down.

 

And now it was undeniable that Lee resembled Avon—but in a strange way too, Blake thought he resembled Olag Gan.

 


	2. Notes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Notes on the references made in the story.

The title is derived from an interview with Tom Baker, who along with Gareth Thomas desired a _Doctor Who_ / _Blake's 7_ crossover to take place. The crossover never materialized.

 

For the Doctor, this story takes place between _Warrior's Gate_ and _The Keeper of Traken_. For Blake, it takes place immediately after his escape from the _Liberator_ at the start of _Blake's 7_ Season C.

 

The Doctor remembers meeting Kerr Avon of  _Blake's 7_ on Kaldor, from the  _Doctor Who_ serial  _The Robots of Death_ . This is a reference to Kaston Iago, an inhabitant of Kaldor City played by Avon's actor Paul Darrow, who is probably Avon in some form or another. Iago is from the  _Doctor Who_ audio series  _Kaldor City_ (2001-2004; 2012). 

 

Jenna meeting the Thirteenth Doctor is from the previous story in this trilogy.

 

While I'm not going to note every  _Doctor Who_ or  _Blake's 7_ reference that pops up, I do have to point out the Doctor's remarks references his leaving K9 Mark III with Sarah Jane Smith on Earth in  _K9 and Company_ . As per a variety of  _Doctor Who_ comics, K9 Mark III traveled with the Doctor and Adric for a time after those two left E-Space. The other reference in that passage, concerning the Doctor's other selves and the Rani, is indeed meant to be a nod to  _Dimensions in Time_ .

 

Karnation Lee is the recurring original character from this trilogy. Ms. Young was the Fourth Doctor's companion in the 1979 comic story “The Sea Devil” (no relation to  _the_ Sea Devils). She was an obvious redraw of Leela, having both her speech patterns and her knife. This story attempts to explain who she really was. Sexton Blake is a British detective who was created in 1893 by Harry Blyth. Nelson Lee is a detective created by Dr. John Staniforth in 1894. Both of them began life as Sherlock Holmes clones, but developed into their own characters over many decades of publication.

 

The Kraals faced the Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith in  _The Android Invasion_ (and Leela met them in the audio story  _The Oseidon Adventure_ ). Taren Capel is the evil roboticist who battled the Doctor and Leela in  _The Robots of Death_ . 

 

Vaughn Orloff is based on Dr. Von Housen from the film  _Vampire Over London_ (1952). Mademoiselle Miton, the Black Wolf, is from the Nelson Lee stories. Varga Lee is an original character, but she is based on the wife of the unnamed character played by Bela Lugosi in  _Plan 9 from Outer Space_ (1959). In my Awful Orloffs series, I conflated this nameless Lugosi character with Von Housen because Von Housen was also played by Lugosi. Sarah and Cody Lee are from the film  _The Abomination_ (1986); “shiqquwts” is a Hebrew word meaning “abomination,” which I used as the name of the demons who haunt Earth-13151518 in my online story  _Words from the Inner Circle_ . The reference to Yog-Sothoth, of the Cthulhu Mythos, is a nod to how  _The Abomination_ was inspired by H.P. Lovecraft's “The Dunwich Horror” (1928). The Eddorians are the evil aliens from E.E. “Doc” Smith's Lensmen series; in my Awful Orloff series I conflated them with the aliens from  _Plan 9 from Outer Space_ . 

 

Nipper, Eileen Dare, and Captain Billy Masters are all from the Nelson Lee stories. In those stories Rajah and Wolf were the names of Lee's dogs; here, I imagined them as more like Moreauvian creatures, with Wolf meant to be the character of the same name from the  _Star Fox_ series. “St. Frank” and “St. Ninian” are named after St. Frank's and St. Ninian's, the schools that Lee ended up working for. Umlosi and his dream-snake familiar were two of Nelson Lee's helpers. Dr. Karnak was one of his enemies, but I conflate him here with Elwyn Clayton, the vampire from the film  _Dead Men Walk_ (1944). This is because I've also linked Clayton to the Egyptian cultist Andoheb from the film  _The Mummy's Hand_ (1940) and its sequels. Both characters were played by George Zucco. (All Nelson Lee information was made known to me thanks to Jess Nevins' awesome Nelson Lee page.)

 

Alice Perkins is from BBV Productions' audio drama series  _The Time Travelers_ (1998-2004). This series began by detailing the adventures of “the Professor” and “Ace,” played by Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred. It was too obvious that they were portraying the Seventh Doctor and Ace, so after a cease-and-desist letter they instead became the Dominie and Alice. In the final story, “Punchline,” the Dominie appears under the name Dominic Perkins. That Alice is his niece is a reference to Sylvester McCoy's suggestion that the Professor be renamed “the Uncle.” While there's nothing stopping Alice from being Ace under a different name, in the previous story in this trilogy it was implied that Alice was Ace's counterpart from the Obverse, an alternate dimension from the  _Doctor Who_ expanded universe. Solomon is from BBV's video series,  _The Stranger_ (1991-1995). Solomon is played by Colin Baker and while the first video suggests that the Stranger could be the Sixth Doctor in exile as per  _The Twin Dilemma_ , later Stranger stories prove he is not the Doctor. 

 

Ms. Young's origin is a joke referencing a detail from  _Resurrection of the Daleks_ , where Leela's footage from a montage of all previous Doctors and companions was accidentally cut. The image's thief was a creature similar to the Wire from the New Who episode “The Idiot's Lantern.” Young references the audio story  _The Child_ which says that Leela was captured after the Time War, where she died in captivity. She was reincarnated on Earth as a girl named Emily. For a while I wondered if Emily could merely be a regeneration of Leela—having married a Time Lord, Andred, Leela could have become a Time Lady and gained her own regeneration cycle. But that is merely my speculation.

 

 


End file.
